by Addison Jane
We’re thrown back into darkness again.
Back into that cell we’d just escaped, but at least this time, we had a fighting chance. This time, the playing field was more even, and when he swung, we could swing back.
And we would.
The footsteps rounded the stairs and began up to the third floor. Though, they only made it halfway. The sound that took over was almost demonic. This laughter. The deep rumbling chuckle echoed against the walls and the hardwood floors. “I should have known better, Avery!” Garrett called out loudly. “I should have known you’d be one of those ones.”
One step back down.
Another.
And another until he was back on the second floor.
“You know those ones, Avery? The ones who fight back. Who waste their energy on thinking they might be able to win?”
I squeezed Thayleah’s hand, trying not to let the dusty floor get up my nose as we lay there, listening to him move up and down the halls. Whether he was searching for us, I wasn’t sure, but one moment he was pacing the hall, ranting about me, and the next he was frozen on the spot.
And when the roar of motorcycles grows louder and louder, starting to shake the house, I knew why.
They were here.
SHOTGUN
We pulled up at the curb, the plan fucking simple.
Go in.
Get Avery and Thayleah out.
Remove Garrett Drake discretely if possible. If not, at least make it look like an accident.
Though, both those ideas soon flew out the window when the bastard stepped out the front doors on his own accord.
“You did this,” he screamed off the porch, several Beta Beta members behind him looking at each other as if maybe someone knew what the hell he was talking about. “An eye for an eye, right, Shotgun? You told my nephew if you ever came back, it would be to burn the house down with him inside.”
My brothers and I had moved in closer, but we stalled for a second when he stepped back inside, grabbing a large container and tipping it up, the liquid spilling out everywhere.
I wasn’t sure what hit me first.
The smell of gasoline or the flicker of the match as he struck and tossed it through the air before ducking back inside and slamming the front doors shut.
“Fuck!” I cursed, covering my face.
The ball of heat hit us, forcing us back. The flames instantly began to climb the house, the accelerant doing its fucking job. And while I was looking forward to hurting the bastard and causing him as much pain as possible, all he’d done was to make killing him more urgent.
“Go around the back. See if you can call out to the girls. Grab anyone who comes out and ask if they’ve seen them.”
Repo, Mix, and Kid rushed around the side of the house. We weren’t completely sure they were inside, but by Garrett’s reaction and his “eye for an eye” comment, I had bets on that being exactly the case.
I just needed to get them out and fast.
AVERY
“You’ve ruined my life,” Garrett called, his heavy footsteps rushing up the staircase. “I have fucking nothing left. So, you should be fucking scared. You should be petrified because if I go down, you come with me.”
The change was so quick.
So fast for him to go from confident and cocky to completely overcome with rage and determined to destroy whoever had wronged him.
Even my sister’s killer admitted to the court that if she hadn’t constantly been teasing him with her sexy clothing and sweet personality, he wouldn’t have gotten angry when he asked her out, and she turned him down.
He blamed Micah for saying no.
Because in his mind, he couldn’t understand the concept of her not wanting him.
Because in his mind, he was so fucking perfect, and saying no was an insult to him as a man.
“Do you smell that?” Thayleah whispered as the waft of smoke hit my nose. “Oh God, that’s fire.” Her hand squeezed mine tighter, her entire body beginning to shake.
“Come out, come out…”
He wasn’t moving anymore, not walking around, not bothering to look for us because we were on fire. The building was on fire. And he knew either we were going to die inside like he’d intended, or he was going to kill us as we tried to escape.
“Avery!” The sound of someone calling my name was quiet but it was there.
“Avery!” Another voice.
Kid.
My heart leaped up into my throat, and I started to wiggle out of the tight space.
“Avery, don’t leave me. Please. Please,” Thayleah whispered through tears, her hands reaching for me.
“Come on, it’s okay,” I urged, ignoring every pain in my body that screamed at me to give the hell up as I crawled to the window. Holding the ledge, I pulled myself up just enough to see out into the backyard. Smoke was already billowing into the air, and I could hear a fire truck siren screaming in the distance. But it was the sight of Kid below us that gave me that little bit of hope I desperately needed.
My fingers worked the latch on the old window with absolute precision, barely making a sound. If Garrett heard, we were done. The windows eased open, and I stuck my head out. Kid jumping almost out of his skin before he let out a sigh of relief. He opened his mouth to yell, but I pressed my finger to my lips, telling him so politely to shut the hell up.
Kid waved to someone, and Repo appeared below the window next to Kid.
Scanning the side of the house quickly, I realized there was nothing to climb down on, but I knew if I helped, I could lower Thayleah far enough so they could catch and not hurt her. “Come on,” I hissed quietly, grabbing her hand and pulling her to the window. Her eyes widened when she looked down, and she tried to pull back. “Thayleah, they are going to make sure you are safe. They are going to get you the hell out of this hellhole and away from Garrett Drake.”
Her whole body was shaking, and I knew how she felt. I could smell the smoke, and honestly, the room was starting to get a little hazy. I grabbed her hands and pulled her close. “If we stay here, we burn,” I told her, my voice cracking as a loud bang from downstairs shook the house. “You trust me, right?”
She swallowed, a hard lump present in her throat, but it only took a second for her to nod and another for us to get her out the window, slowly lowering herself down while looking up at me in pure fear.
Kid, Repo, and Mix were a few feet below her, ready to catch her with ease.
“Let go, Thayleah,” I murmured, checking behind me urgently before turning back to her. “They’ve got you, I promise.”
Her eyes pinched closed, and this calmness came over her for a second, then she was gone.
I lurched forward, looking down, seeing her cradled in Mix’s arms as he rushed away. Kid and Repo looked back up, Repo waving for me to hurry.
Grabbing the window frame, I lifted one leg over the side, rea—
“Not today,” the growl came from behind me, and I screamed as I flew backward, my ass hitting the floor first and sending shockwaves up my spine.
“Avery,” Kid shouted.
I wanted to call back, but my throat was completely clogged with tears, my scalp in agonizing pain as someone used my hair to pull me across the wooden floors and out of the bedroom Thayleah and I had been hiding in.
My body connected with the doorframe as they rounded the corner, dragging me behind them like a kid would a small cart. My already bruised ribs took most of the impact, and I couldn’t stop the painful scream that tumbled from my mouth.
The fire trucks were whirling loudly outside, the fire lapping at the staircase as I was hauled past.
Breathing was becoming hard as the air gave in and was pushed out by the thick, dark smoke.
Suddenly we stopped, the pressure in my head releasing while I fought for breath. My eyes stung in the smoke, but I forced them to look up, Garrett looming over me with a knife in his hand. “Why do you have to be so defiant? Why can’t you women ever listen? Why d
oes it always have to be like this?”
He swiped.
I lifted my arm, trying to fend him off and protect myself, but his knife clipped my skin.
“Because you are not God,” I screamed through my tears, coughing and gagging but fighting to get the words out. Blood trickled down my arm, but I was scared to put them down in case he tried to attack me again. “Because you don’t get to control who lives and dies.”
I was so sick of these men.
Sick of these monsters.
Sick of the way they hide behind these perfect faces.
“You’re wrong,” he hissed, a manic smile curling the corners of his mouth. “Because I’m about to decide your fate right now.” He pulled the knife back, and I knew this time he wasn’t going to stop at one slice.
He was going to attack and attack until he was done.
Until he felt like he had achieved his goal.
To take my life.
SHOTGUN
“Avery! Goddammit,” I cursed, looking at the way the flames climbed and climbed so fucking quickly.
Mix suddenly appeared beside the house, a young girl in his arms who I recognized instantly. “Thayleah jumped. Avery was climbing out after her, but she was pulled bac—”
I didn’t need to hear the rest.
“She’s on the second floor!”
I was already running, rushing around the side of the house, desperately searching for another entrance with the front door looking like the gates to hell.
“This way,” Holly called, gun in her hand, as she ducked past me and disappeared around a corner. I didn’t hesitate, jerking to a stop at a large wooden door.
She tried the handle, jiggling it for about two seconds, before I tugged her out of the way and drove my fucking boot through the lock, chips of wood spraying off it as it flew open, and slammed back against the wall.
I rushed in, instantly being smacked in the face by a wave of fucking smoke.
We kept low, trying to stay below the rising toxins, my face feeling like it might melt off as we got closer to the front foyer where Garrett had started this shitshow. The entire room was almost alight, but I wasn’t about to stop.
I wasn’t about to lose Avery.
This bastard wasn’t going to take another person from my life.
I held my breath, running into the inferno and around the banister at the bottom of the stairs. Holly was close behind me, the both of us taking two steps at a time up to the second floor, hitting the top just as Garrett pulled a sparkling knife back over his head, his aim on my old lady as she lay on the ground beneath him.
My body moved on its own, leaning in, and driving my shoulder straight into his side, the knife clattering onto the floor. We both hit the ground hard, me on top of him. Rage coursed through me, and I didn’t bother to fight it. Instead, I used it as fuel. Garrett tried to escape, wiggling and squirming underneath me like the little fucking bug he was.
I grabbed a fist full of the front of his shirt and drew back, driving punch after punch through his face.
Bones were cracking.
And I’m pretty sure some of them are mine, but it didn’t stop me.
All I could see was the blood sprayed across Emma’s ceiling above her bed. All I could hear were the conversations in my head I was going to have to have with Gage when he got older, telling him how this bastard stole his mom from him. And when I did, I wanted him to know he got what he deserved. I wanted him to know I did what I had to do to make sure his mom could rest peacefully.
I welcomed the pain that came with knowing Garrett wasn’t going to walk out of here. That he was going to bleed and burn. That he wasn’t going to hurt anyone else.
This was for Emma.
It was for Avery.
And it was for Gage.
“Shotgun! We need to go!” I couldn’t stop, the blood clouding my vision. “Shotgun!”
A body hit my back, arms curling around my neck.
I knew her body anywhere.
I knew its shape, its warmth, the feel of her heart as it raced.
“Gage needs us,” she murmured, her words making my hand uncurl from Garrett’s shirt, his body falling limp to the floor. “We need to get out of here and go home to him.” Emotion choked her, each word sounding like it was hard to get out through the tears that dampened my skin.
She slipped back, and I turned around, not waiting another second before I gathered her in my arms and lifted her off the floor. Her legs circled my waist, her body clung to mine like a monkey. “Let’s go home to him.”
The three of us headed for the stairs as two firemen in full protective suits appeared. “Come on. Come on!” they urged, ushering us through the small space they’d created in the flames. “Is there anyone else up there? This place is old and unstable.”
The perfect resting place for a man who wanted to be infamous—a pile of fucking ashes that would be swept aside like it didn’t even exist.
Like it was fucking nothing.
Like he was fucking no one.
Which is exactly who he would be from now on.
“No,” I answered, my voice raw and raspy. “No one.” I placed Avery on the ground, the both of us falling to our knees trying to suck in as much fresh air as we possibly could to clear out clogged lungs. My brothers crowded around us, ushering over EMTs who offered us oxygen and tried to check our injuries.
“Are you sure there’s no one in there?” a policeman asked, crouching down beside Holly as she choked and heaved. Her eyes met mine over his shoulder, and I watched as she shook her head back and forth. “No. No one else.”
“Avery?” I looked up at the sweet voice that hovered over us, a young girl who I instantly recognized appearing with Mix and Kid hovering protectively around her.
Avery rolled over on the grass, sitting up and opening her arms. Thayleah dove into her, sobbing softly into my old lady’s chest. The pain on Avery’s face was obvious, but she wouldn’t say a single fucking word, her only mission to soothe the broken girl in her arms.
“Thayleah, this is Shotgun.” She turned toward me, her eyes sparkling, the same color as Emma’s. “I promised her she wouldn’t be alone when we escaped. That I wouldn’t let her end up with no one.”
Avery thought she was subtle, but I could already see the bond these two had formed, and I knew it was only going to get stronger.
Avery was born to be a mother figure. She was born to care, to protect, and to love harder than I’d ever seen someone fucking love.
It was why I needed her by my side.
It was why the club needed her.
Why Gage and Thayleah needed her.
And God help it if another motherfucker tries to take her from me.
From us.
“Well, Thayleah,” I rasped with a grin. “Welcome to the family.”
The tightness in her body eased, and she sank into Avery’s arms, the smile on my old lady’s face bright and warm.
“And by family, I mean shitshow.”
AVERY
One Month Later
Watching Shotgun and Gage lay sleeping in bed together in the mornings had quickly become my favorite thing, the two of them becoming more and more like twins each and every damn day. And today, I needed that vision of them more so than ever.
I thought maybe I’d feel differently this time. Maybe now I’d found people who cared about me and loved me just like Micah did, that it wouldn’t hurt so much not having her here with me. And yet, I still woke up today feeling like there was a piece of me missing. A chip in my heart that I could live the rest of my life without, but that I still kept trying to fill.
Would my birthday always be this way?
A day I’m not sure I’ll ever claim back for me. How could I? Me getting older every year wasn’t exactly something to be celebrated when my beautiful big sister will never get that same experience ever again.
Forever stuck there.
This weird limbo.
Tears trick
led silently down my cheeks as I tied my shoes.
“Happy birthday.”
I should have known better than to try and escape him, try to hide my bullshit from the one person in this entire place that had already known just exactly what this day of the year does to me. I looked up, this gorgeous specimen of a man standing over me, beautiful, sexy, strong, and loyal. And to top it off—he loved me.
I got to my feet, our bodies a mere few inches apart, and my throat so clogged with emotion I’m not sure the words I wanted to say would even come out. “If I’m still broken now, at a point in my life when I have more love surrounding me than ever before… am I ever really going to feel fixed?”
“What needs fixing?”
“The pain,” I murmur. “This pain I feel in my chest when I think of her. It’s my birthday. I should be happy. I should be celebrating, but it just hurts.”
Shotgun reached out, brushing my hair back from my face and swiping at the tears that just wouldn’t stop coming. “Who the hell said we need to fix being sad about the people we miss?” He cupped my face in his hands and pulled me in, the warmth of his skin seeping through my thin shirt, this comforting heat that radiated off him, instantly sweeping me up and wrapping me tightly.
“Let it hurt. Think about her. Remember her. And just feel the fucking pain that comes with missing the hell out of someone who meant so fucking much to you because the second your heart stops aching when you think of her, it means she doesn’t matter anymore.”
“She’ll always matter.”
“Exactly,” he answered, pressing a kiss to my forehead. “Now, if you still want to run away and mope and feel fucking sorry for yourself… can that part of the day be postponed until later? Because we have somewhere to be this morning.”
I raised my brow. “I’m going to ignore the mocking of my emotions and cut straight to… where do we have to be?”
“Somewhere,” he replied, the definitive tone leaving no room to argue. “There’s a dress on the bed upstairs. We’ve got about an hour to get ready and get into town.”